Darkness and Daylight
by Llyzbeth
Summary: While on an away-mission with B'Elanna, an injured Harry has to sort out how he feels.
1. Into Darkness

Quick note from the Author: Yeah, I know the series is over. I know Tom and B'Elanna had a baby. And I'm still not happy about any of it. You can assume this fanfic happened, oh, around second season or so. In fact, just ignore Blood Fever and anything that happened after, and you can assume this happened any time you like.  
  
Disclaimer: I'm neither the creator of Star Trek, Voyager, nor any of its regular characters. Heck, I didn't even come up with the term "Selelvian". You can thank Peter David for that one.  
  
Why yes, I'd love some feedback, thanks!  
  
  
  
  
  
Chapter 1.  
  
Harry blinked into the darkness, wondering for a moment why his quarters were so dark, why the windows weren't letting in even a little of the stars' light.  
  
He turned his head to the right, and realized two things at once. One, that he was lying on rough, cold rock. Two, that if he moved that suddenly again, he was pretty sure the pain in his head would make him pass out.  
  
As he held very still and listened to the ringing in his ears, the past few hours gradually swam into memory.  
  
Voyager had come across yet another M-class planet, this one uninhabited by any kind of intelligent life. Very nearly uninhabited by any kind of life at all. With the hopes of finding more food for the ship's stores, new possibilities for fuel, and, as always, some way to get home, the Captain had decided to explore the planet for a few hours.  
  
Not that it was easy. Traces of an unknown mineral in the planet's strata interfered with many of the ship's sensors.  
  
In an unknown area as big as the Delta quadrant, with thousands of new stars, tens of thousands of new planets, and hundreds of thousands of new landscapes, life-forms, and substances to discover, it's not all that surprising that there should be yet another unknown mineral that affects a starship's sensors.  
  
But it was annoying, nonetheless.  
  
The atmosphere was breathable, they could tell that much. That gravity was close to Earth-normal, they could tell that too. They knew there were no obvious cities, satellites, or colonizations of any kind they'd seen before. But they couldn't tell anything about the plantforms (if there were any) or the mineral content of the planet's surface. Nor, apparently, were the transporters being very cooperative in bringing up any samples from orbit.  
  
Tom had sighed and said it was typical. The Delta quadrant was out to get them.  
  
But, after seven weeks of uninterrupted travel between solar systems, any distraction was a welcome break. So a shuttlecraft had been tuned up and a team of six had gone down to the surface.  
  
Tom had gingerly landed the shuttlecraft (he didn't think he could take the sarcastic remarks from Chakotay if he totaled ANOTHER shuttle) and he and the other five stepped outside.  
  
Harry decided within a few seconds that this wasn't going to be a popular shore-leave spot. Iron-gray spires of rock stabbed the orange sky at odd angles, while clouds of pale dust swirled sluggishly around their boots. The air was warm and thick, an overabundance of carbon-dioxide in the air making everyone breathe a little faster to get all the oxygen they needed.  
  
"Niiiiice," Tom commented. Several of the science team members nodded while looking around. B'Elanna tapped an instruction into the tricorder, frowned at it, then turned it over to begin fiddling with its inner workings.  
  
"Anything?" Harry asked, slinging his pack to the ground and pulling out several sample containers.  
  
"Almost," she answered distractedly. "Once I get some kind of idea about what's blocking the sensors I should be able to filter it out of the tricorder's input."  
  
"Hm." Tom pondered. "I'm still not sure why you couldn't just do that from the ship."  
  
"Takes more time," Harry answered, peering over B'Elanna's shoulder.  
  
"What?"  
  
B'Elanna paused a moment to look up at Tom. "To filter something out of one tricorder takes a few minutes maybe. We won't have the best readings in the world from it, but it's good enough for a look around. If you want to recalibrate the sensors on the ship to filter out the interference, you've got to get past security clearances, remodulate the information-processors, fine-tune all the hundreds of interchangers.." she saw Tom's eyes glaze over and finished with "It just takes forever."  
  
"I got it," Tom said with a smile. "And this planet's hardly worth it."  
  
"Exactly," B'Elanna agreed, and returned Tom's smile.  
  
Looking from one face to the other Harry got a glimmering of an idea. Half- formed, the thought made him clench his fingers into fists. Puzzled, he looked down at his hands, uncurling them thoughtfully. What was all THAT about? Why should the thought of something going on between Tom and B'Elanna bother him? It's not like..  
  
Shaking his head, he began sifting through the chalk-dry dust at his feet, dropping the occasional stone into a container. Tom began to shovel the odd handful of sand into a series of small bags. Andrea and T'chalo, the two from the biology department, examined the few spindly blue-grey leaves that hung from a thorny plant, while Dadgh from seismology walked a small distance from the rest of the group with his satchel of equipment.  
  
  
  
  
  
"Not too far."  
  
From her seat on the wind-smoothed rock B'Elanna heard Harry call out to Dadgh. "Wait till we get the communicators working before you do any long- range exploring." B'Elanna looked up to see Dadgh wave absently, setting a small reader on the ground before continuing on. She looked back down at the stubborn tricorder and snapped a relay back into place.  
  
"Harry, Tom," she called out. "Stand up and hold still a second. I want to see if the tricorder can distinguish you from the surroundings yet."  
  
Obediently the two of them stood up. She heard Harry mumble to Tom "Say cheese," but she ignored that, frowning instead at the readings that scrolled across the tiny screen.  
  
Tom's voice floated back over the sandy expanse. "If it doesn't work, it's Harry's fault."  
  
"Bite me, pilot," Harry's unconcerned voice replied. The readings on the tricorder wavered a bit, due to Tom and Harry jostling each other.  
  
"Behave, children," B'Elanna said, not even bothering to look up.  
  
The wind carried back snatches of the resulting conversation. "He started it." "Did not." "Did too." "Not." "Too." And B'Elanna mentally sighed and wondered if Starfleet knew how weird their crewmen got without anything interesting to occupy them for a few months.  
  
"Hey," Dadgh's voice swam up over a rocky wall. "There're some caves over here."  
  
"Has to be more interesting underground than up here," Tom quipped, and started toward the Selelvian's voice. He stopped for a moment to give a hand to B'Elanna, who accepted it without thinking. He pulled her to her feet, and she stared for a moment into ice-blue eyes and an adventurous smile.  
  
"Race you to the entrance?" he asked, quirking an eyebrow.  
  
"Pass," she answered with a smile. He nodded and she watched the back of his head as he carefully picked his way among the dust and boulders.  
  
"Anybody in there?" Harry's voice startled her, and she looked behind her and up into his face.  
  
Something's odd about his eyes today, she thought to herself. They had a hardness around the edges, matching the corners of his mouth. His whole face had a smooth blankness to it, like a closed window.  
  
"Something bothering you, Starfleet?" She accompanied the cynical tone with a concerned look. The well-deep eyes blinked at her, and his expression softened into a laughing smile.  
  
"No, just fine thanks. Come on, we'd better make sure they don't get into any trouble."  
  
She watched him go, shrugged, and then followed after them.  
  
  
  
Dadgh was staring into the cavern's mouth when they arrived. Tom considered telling him to pick his jaw up off the floor, but he had to admit they were starting at an impressive sight.  
  
Once the planet had probably been as damp and rain-blessed as Earth. What happened to change things they might never know, but the evidence of all that water still remained.  
  
Hundreds of stalactites hung down toward the floor. The absence of stalagmites underneath them suggested that the floor used to be underwater. Whorls and eddies carved into the rocky ground supported the idea.  
  
When the water had finished sculpting the cave's mouth, the wind had taken over. Instead of simple pointed cones, the stalactites were carved into wavering, sharp-edged designs. They looked more like melting ice than stone.  
  
The razor-edged sculptures marched along the cave's ceiling into darkness. Harry pulled a hand-light out of this satchel and waved the beam into the depths.  
  
"There won't be so much erosion further into the cave," Dadgh commented absently.  
  
"Anybody up for a look?" Harry asked.  
  
Tom nodded, remembering Mammoth Caves in Kentucky back on Earth, wondering if they'd compare with what he was looking at now. B'Elanna mumbled acceptance of the idea, but Dadgh shook himself before answering.  
  
"I'm all for it, but we'd better watch it. I'm picking up some low-level seismic readings every few minutes."  
  
"Anything we need to worry about?" B'Elanna asked.  
  
The Selelvian shrugged. "Not that I can see, but the planet's interference is still messing with the equipment. Best guess, we should be fine."  
  
Tom nodded. He looked to B'Elanna and Harry. "Ok, do we go in or not?" Andrea and T'chalo had wandered over by this point. Harry and B'Elanna glanced at each other.  
  
"Not all of us," B'Elanna finally offered. "We'll have to have somebody outside to watch the shuttle in case of emergencies."  
  
"I'm going in, at any rate," Dadgh said. No one seemed surprised.  
  
"I'll stay," Andrea said. The diminutive Andorian had to poke T'chalo to get his attention. "You with me?"  
  
"Sure, no problem," he piped up before he'd heard the question.  
  
B'Elanna, Tom, Harry, and Dadgh entered the cave while Andrea and T'chalo continued gathering samples. Daylight, such as it was, soon faded as they went further in, and the hand-light B'Elanna carried sliced into the darkness.  
  
The inside was no less dry, but he stalactites were more whole. Huge pillars disappeared into the dark above them, stopping at a point handsbreaths from the floor. The party had to weave their way through a maze of stony teeth, walking single file through narrow paths as the cave sloped further and further down.  
  
The earthquake, when it happened, didn't catch them COMPLETELY by surprise. Dadgh had continued placing his seismic readers every hundred feet or so. Even with the planet's interference, there was no mistaking the sudden spike in the readings.  
  
He had time to shout "Quake!!.." before the ground slammed up and sideways, slapping them into the walls. Fist-sized stones crashed out of the darkness above them.  
  
Tom, lying face down on the ground, hands cupped over his head, felt a crushing weight on his right leg. His head snapped around to see what the HELL had fallen on him, his teeth grinding down on a scream.  
  
He looked around just in time to see B'Elanna dodge a toppling pillar, dropping the hand-light in the process. Before the tiny light was crushed it illuminated Harry, crumpled on the ground, a bloodstained stone bouncing away from his head and a red stream curling down his face.  
  
A boulder fell squarely on the hand-light, and darkness closed over everything. 


	2. Through the Darkness

Harry tried to force the ringing out of his ears. His eyes hurt from trying to see something in a blackness so complete it felt like it could suffocate him. He sternly told himself to take slow, deep breaths, not an easy thing when his whole body was sending out desperate signals for him to panic panic panic.  
  
"Help.."  
  
The call coming through the darkness, eerily muffled, made Harry jump.  
  
"Tom!" The answer was B'Elanna's, and Harry felt the pain in his head fade momentarily with relief.  
  
Steeling himself, he drew his knees underneath himself and sat up. The glass shards that seemed to flow through his temples were bad, but not as bad as he'd expected.  
  
"I think..my leg's broken.."  
  
Harry licked oddly dry lips. "Hang on Tom, I'm coming."  
  
"Glad you're still with us, Starfleet." B'Elanna's voice, though cynical, sounded relieved. Harry smiled as he fumbled along the ground for his satchel.  
  
"You think I'd leave and let you have all the fun?"  
  
"Human," a new voice floated out of the dark. "You have the oddest idea of fun."  
  
"Dadgh, are you.." Harry drew in a hissing gasp. He'd dropped his head a little in his search for the satchel. The sensation of his brain rolling against a spike made him freeze. "..alright?" he finished through clenched teeth.  
  
"A little bruised, nothing serious. Tom sounds bad, though.  
  
"I'm on it," Harry said as his fingers closed on the fabric of the satchel.  
  
A few moments later he had the light on and had stumbled over to Tom. B'Elanna and Dadgh, following the light, helped him roll the man-sized stone off of Tom's leg.  
  
Tom tried to grin up at them, but pain pulled his face at odd angles. "Well this isn't..so much fun anymore."  
  
B'Elanna ran the tricorder down his leg, asking "Anybody know which way is out?"  
  
Dadgh pointed at the depressingly solid wall of boulders behind them. "It WAS this way. I'll try to climb over it, but we've got to get Tom out of the area."  
  
"I don't like the idea of moving him yet," B'Elanna pointed out.  
  
"And I don't' like the idea of knocking one of those boulders loose and breaking his other leg. Or his head. Or.."  
  
"Fine, fine," B'Elanna interrupted impatiently. "But we'll stop the bleeding and make some kind of splint first. Alright?"  
  
"Fine." At Dadgh's answer B'Elanna grabbed Harry's satchel away from him and pulled out the slightly crushed contents of the med-pack.  
  
Harry had the vague idea that he should be participating in the argument, but the only thing that he could concentrate on was the fact that something was dripping into his eye. He tiredly rubbed at his face while holding the light on Tom and B'Elanna. He stared blankly down at his hand. His fingers had come away red, and he knew THAT was important at least.  
  
"Hand me the tissue mender when you're done with it, B'Elanna."  
  
She dropped it in his hand without looking. Harry noticed that while bruises so purple they were almost black covered the skin of Tom's leg, at least there wasn't any more blood flowing out of it. Sure, it was bent at a weird angle, but not-bleeding was a good sign, right?  
  
Harry signed as he held the 'mender up to the shallow tear on his scalp. His thoughts were chasing themselves around in circles. He had a feeling he'd been hit a little harder than was strictly healthy.  
  
The Selelvian was staring at him oddly. "Harry, are you ok?"  
  
"Sure, I'm fine." He forced his hand to stay steady and looked unblinkingly back at Dadgh. No matter how envious he was of Tom at the moment, he refused to call attention to a bump on the head just to get B'Elanna's notice.  
  
He shook himself. What was the matter with him? He actually wanted to be in TOM'S position at the moment? Tom lying in agony with a broken leg? Sure, having B'Elanna carefully attend to one's wounds must be nice, but was it worth lying crushed and bleeding on the ground?  
  
A tiny part of his mind said "you had better believe it.." but it was mostly drowned out by the ringing between his ears, so he ignored it.  
  
Dadgh was still staring at him. "I'm fine," Harry repeated. "Just a little shook up is all."  
  
  
  
  
  
The Selelvian curled his fingers around another stone and drew the rest of himself up. The hand-light bounced on his chest, hung by a makeshift strap. The light's movement caused shadows to loom and fade around him, but Dadgh's whole concentration centered on finding another stable rock and moving up the pile.  
  
It had taken more than an hour before B'Elanna thought Tom could be moved. Even then, the mild painkillers in the med-pack hadn't done much to keep Tom comfortable while they moved him.  
  
Dadgh had volunteered to climb the stone pile. He'd rationalized it with a few teasing remarks about "clumsy humans", (and, truth be told, Selelvians are a good bit more agile than most humans) but the real reason he went was because he felt responsible for the whole mess. He'd found the caves, he'd been all for going inside, and if everyone hadn't put trust in his experience, they might've skipped going in at all when they heard about the tremors.  
  
One sweat-slicked hand slid off a smooth bounder, and he had to claw at the dusty stones to keep from tumbling back down the pile.  
  
"Idiot," he snarled at himself through gritted teeth. "Pay attention."  
  
Inch by inch he crawled up the pile.  
  
  
  
  
  
Harry stared dully at Tom, who stared back dully at nothing.  
  
When Dadgh had started climbing, Harry had managed to swipe the hypo-spray full of painkillers. His head still ached around the temples, but his brain seemed to be moving in a straight line again.  
  
Too bad the 'sprays in the med-pack were so damn general-purpose. Couldn't block out specific pains, just worked more as a spread-out sedative. By the time someone got a dose big enough to COMPLETELY cover over more serious pain, they tended to go a bit spacey for a while.  
  
Tom was kind of case-in-point at the moment.  
  
Harry sighed and looked down the low tunnel on his right that B'Elanna had crawled into an hour ago. She'd had the idea that while Dadgh was busy checking the way they'd come in, she'd be looking for a way out.  
  
At the time, Harry'd been relieved that she'd been all set on going herself. His head hurt worse just THINKING about crawling down one of those passageways.  
  
Now he couldn't shake the certainty that she was hurt, or trapped somewhere, or lost, or..  
  
Only his promise to keep an eye on Tom kept him from going after her.  
  
So he stayed put, sharing his gaze between Tom and the right-hand tunnel, and he wished the cave was still a "live" one, because even a solitary drip of water would've been better than the silence around him. Because after a while your ears got tired of the silence and they started making up sounds out of nothing, and you had to wonder which noises were the ones you made up and which ones came from something else that might or might not be in the cave with you..  
  
B'Elanna appeared out of the tunnel on his LEFT.  
  
They both yelped in surprise and blinded each other with their hand-lights.  
  
Eventually they figured out that B'Elanna's tunnel had formed a complete circle, with no tunnels branching off of it and therefor no way out in THAT direction.  
  
"My turn," Harry said, climbing to his feet. B'Elanna sat down with her back against a wall and scrubbed at the dust on her face with a tired hand. She looked up at Harry and his heart stopped for a moment, looking into her tired, worried, beautiful, beautiful eyes. He surprised himself with how much he wanted to go to her, trace the line of her jaw with one careful finger and tell her how worried he'd been, how he'd do anything to keep her safe.  
  
He wondered what she'd do if he did just that.  
  
Probably laugh, he thought miserably. She'd laugh and curl up next to Tom. And I'd probably go find a nice hole to fall in and stay till Hell had a snow-day.  
  
"Which one?" B'Elanna asked. He blinked at her. She waved a hand in the direction of the two remaining tunnels. "Which one are you going down, Starfleet?"  
  
Oh. He pointed to the closer of the two. "That one looks good." He rubbed his temples, doing his best to ignore the ache that was clamoring for attention.  
  
B'Elanna stared up at him. "Are you sure you're ok?"  
  
He wanted very much to say "Actually, now that you mention it, I think my head's going to split down the center, so that counts as 'not being ok' doesn't it?" Instead he forced a smile and said "Never better."  
  
The weary smile she answered him with was worth the lie. She scooped up the tricorder and moved closer to Tom. "Be careful, Harry." 


	3. Into Daylight

By the time Dadgh made it back B'Elanna was fuming.  
  
She HATED feeling helpless, hated it worse when something she depended on without thought, say tricorders and communicators for example, decided to betray her.  
  
She took it personally. She took it VERY personally. She was just about the pitch the stubborn, uncooperative tricorder (which had just failed to tell her Tom's GENDER, much less his condition) against a wall when clattering stones and a faint beam of light let her know that Dadgh was back.  
  
The Selelvian slumped to the ground and rested his forehead on his hands. The hand-light around his neck spilled white light on the rock underneath him, swaying as he tried to get back his breath. "We're not getting out..that way," he panted.  
  
"What, why?!!" She took a deep breath, grabbed onto her anger with both hands, and started again more calmly. "Why?"  
  
"Blocked all the way to the top," he answered, shaking damp strands of pale hair out of his eyes. "Couldn't move any of the topmost rocks, and without knowing how far back it's blocked I don't want to use a phaser. I could bring it all down on top of us, or the rescue party which might or might not be on the other side." He shook his head, dark smudges of exhaustion under his eyes. "We're stuck here for a while."  
  
B'Elanna clenched her hands against her sides. She spun away with a quiet growl and fully intended to follow it with a louder one until a hand closed over her shoulder.  
  
She turned around to see Harry's smile in the darkness.  
  
"It's ok, I've found a way out."  
  
By the time they got halfway down the tunnel, Harry almost wished they'd just waited for the rescue party.  
  
Burdened by Tom's almost unconscious body, it'd taken them twice as long just to get this far as it'd taken for Harry to get to the outside and back. It would've been a hell of a lot easier if they'd had the materials to make a decent stretcher, but all they'd had was the outer jackets of their uniforms. While Harry had to admit that if they'd been in any other cave, the under-tunics they wore wouldn't have been nearly warm enough, he still found plenty he could've complained about as the three of them carried Tom on a tied-together blanket of jackets. But he kept it to himself. If Tom could keep quiet under all the jostling his crushed leg was getting, then he could too.  
  
As they stopped for yet another rest they tried to set Tom down as gently as possible, but Harry could still see Tom's fingers clench against the cloth as his leg touched the ground. He saw a small patch of fresh blood against Tom's leg, and while it didn't look too bad in itself, Harry didn't like the idea of bone fragments under the skin slicing open an artery or something. Didn't like it at all.  
  
"We can't move him any further," Harry said finally. He expected an argument from B'Elanna, but she stared down at the new blood, then looked up at him and nodded. "Dadgh, stay here with him. B'Elanna and I'll get outside and try to find the rescue party."  
  
"What if you don't find them?" Dadgh asked hollowly.  
  
"We'll figure that out IF that happens," B'Elanna said shortly. "Until then stay put." Taking a deep breath she reached out a hand and clasped Dadgh's shoulder to soften her words. He nodded, and sat beside Tom, his hands loosely holding his hand-light.  
  
And they'd started down the path to the exit, B'Elanna trying to make it out as fast as possible, Harry trying to keep up with her.  
  
They passed alongside a deep drop at one point, and considering that Harry's reflexes weren't at their best, it really was amazing that he managed to catch her hands when the edge of the path crumbled under her feet, dropping most of her into the hole.  
  
They froze like that for an instant, B'Elanna hanging nearly vertical into the pit with no purchase for her feet, Harry lying flat on the edge clinging desperately to her hands. Her weight had slammed his body onto the ground, and the impact plus the strain on his arms caused the pain in his head to slam around inside his skull.  
  
He closed his eyes, shuddering, trying to think of anything except the possibility of his head falling apart right then and there. When he opened his eyes B'Elanna was staring up at him.  
  
"Harry," she said calmly. "You don't look so good."  
  
"I..have a headache." His tongue was having trouble forming the words around the taste of metal in his mouth.  
  
"This isn't a very convenient time for a headache." Her face had dropped two shades paler, but her voice was oddly conversational.  
  
"Tell me about it," he said, inching his way back along the ground until her hands were level with the edge. Little by little they turned her hands around so that she could grab the rock herself. Luckily, the rock didn't continue to crumble, and in a few moments they'd levered her back up onto the shelf of rock.  
  
How long they sat there on the edge Harry couldn't tell. He only gradually became aware of the fact that they were leaning against each other as they stared down into the blackness below them.  
  
"Thanks Harry," her heard her say quietly. He smiled to himself. Having her here, listening to her say his name, was all the thanks he could ever wish for.  
  
When they finally started back down the path again B'Elanna was all business. Harry would've been disappointed if he hadn't been trying so hard to stay on his feet.  
  
The Doc's gonna kill me when we get back to the ship, he thought bemusedly. He'll say I don't take care of myself, that I give him too much work to do. And I'll tell him – Harry laughed to himself at this point – I'll tell him there wasn't any water on the whooole planet, so I couldn't drink lots of fluids, but I promise to take two painkillers and call him in the morning.  
  
He was vaguely aware that the thought shouldn't have been so funny, but he didn't really care. He was laughing quietly when the two of them stepped out into daylight.  
  
Much later, as Dadgh and Harry helped each other down a corridor back on Voyager, Harry still felt like laughing. They'd made their way back to the cave's entrance and found the rescue team desperately pulling boulders out of the way. The look on their faces really had been awfully funny, Harry thought.  
  
With a proper stretcher it hadn't taken long to get Tom out of the cave. They were all bundled into the shuttlecraft in no time at all, and Harry, while receiving another painkiller 'spray, had listened to Andrea and T'chalo take turns telling about feeling the earthquake and watching tons and tons of dust come billowing out of the entrance, and the mad race they'd made back to the shuttle and back to the ship to get a rescue team.  
  
Tom had been beamed directly into sick-bay as soon as they were out of the planet's interference, and since he had a death-grip on B'Elanna's hand they decided to just beam her over with him. Harry would've been a bit downcast at the look of tender concern on her face if he hadn't been feeling so amused at everything.  
  
Once aboard the ship he and Dadgh had ambled down the corridors, both awash in that wonderful feeling you get when it's all over and done with, you're home and you're alive and really, was it all that bad after all?  
  
They passed by the door to Harry's room. "Hang on Dadgh, I want to get into some real clothes first," he said.  
  
Dadgh looked over at him, tilting his head to one side. "Shouldn't you head to sickbay before you do that, you look lousy."  
  
"Thanks," Harry said, laughing at the same time. His head only ached a little around the edges. "But Tom was in pretty bad shape. The Doc'll be busy with him for a while anyway, so I might as well get a shower before I head down."  
  
"Suit yourself," the Selelvian said, reaching out to grab Harry's arm warmly. "Just take care of yourself, ok?"  
  
"You too."  
  
Dadgh had waved as he walked away down the hall, and Harry had slipped into his quarters, humming to himself and grabbing fresh clothes.  
  
He realized he'd made a mistake as soon as he stepped out of the shower. The room spun around him, and the pain in his head came back in spikes, tearing at his temples and driving nails behind his eyes. Holding onto the wall with a trembling hand, he stared at his face in the mirror till the floor stopped moving. Dark eyes stared back at him out of a white, white face, and he told himself with numb lips that now would be a good time to go to sickbay.  
  
He dressed quickly, and was soon at the sickbay entrance. In fact, he had very little memory of the trip from his room. One minute he was finished dressing, and then he was standing in the door.  
  
He stepped inside, blinking at the bright lights the Doc always insisted on. Across the room the Doctor and Kes and B'Elanna were standing around Tom, who was actually sitting on the edge of the bed and smiling.  
  
"Tom," Harry said in surprise, pulling his face into a mask of normality. "Wow, they did a good job fixing you up."  
  
"Yeah, that's what I said," Tom replied, carefully stepping off the bed and putting a little weight on his right leg.  
  
"Mr. Paris was extremely fortunate. He only suffered a compound fracture and minor blood loss," the Doctor said seriously.  
  
Harry saw Kes cover a smile with her hand as Tom replied just as seriously "Yes it was definitely my lucky day."  
  
The sarcasm was completely lost on the doctor. B'Elanna grinned at Harry and said "Feels good to have all that damn dust off doesn't it?" Harry hadn't noticed till then that B'Elanna was showered and changed too. Part of his brain was still tied up keeping his skull together. The other half had been distracted by how amazingly gorgeous she was. It kept taking him by surprise.  
  
Harry leaned against one of the beds nearby, used it to keep himself upright as he folded his arms to keep his hands from shaking. "I need to talk to you when you've got a minute, Doctor."  
  
"Certainly." The Doctor picked up the medical tricorder and walked over to him.  
  
"Guess I'll get out of your way," Tom said as he hobbled over to Harry. "Any parting instructions, Doc?"  
  
"Yes," the Doctor said while scanning Harry. "Drink plenty of fluids, and get some rest. You'll be off-duty for the next thirty-six hours. Ms. Torres, could you escort Mr. Paris to his room? If he tries to go anywhere near the bridge confine him to his quarters."  
  
"Aye aye sir."  
  
"Hey Harry," Tom said, looking at him seriously. "Thanks for getting me out of there. I wouldn't have made it without all of you."  
  
Harry nodded and smiled back at him. Tom moved for the door.  
  
"Mr. Kim." The Doctor's voice was angry. "Are you aware that.."  
  
"Just a minute Doctor," and suddenly B'Elanna was facing Harry, reaching out to touch his arm for the briefest moment. "Thanks again, Harry," she said simply.  
  
He grinned at her. "I was too afraid for my life to let you fall."  
  
"Right," she grinned back. "If you'd dropped me I would've killed you." They laughed, and she headed for the door. "But thanks all the same," she said over her shoulder. She put a hand on Tom's back and guided him to the door.  
  
"You're welcome," Harry whispered. The door opened.  
  
"Mr. Kim!" The Doctor's voice was insistent, and awfully loud despite the high ringing tone that bounced between Harry's ears. "Are you aware..Mr. Kim, are you listening to me?"  
  
B'Elanna and Tom passed through the door, and it hissed shut behind them.  
  
"Mr. Kim, you have a serious concussion, you need to lie down immediately!"  
  
"Sounds like a good idea," Harry heard himself say, and the floor obligingly tilted sideways and slammed into his face, just before everything went black.  
  
Harry gradually swam up out of soft darkness to realize he was awake. He also realized that his head didn't hurt anymore, and the release from pain was such a relief he had to smile sleepily.  
  
A sharp intake of breath made him open his eyes. At first he only saw the sickbay ceiling. When he carefully looked to his left, he almost stopped breathing.  
  
Sitting beside him, inches away, holding his hand between her own, was B'Elanna.  
  
To backtrack a bit, B'Elanna hadn't gone all the way to Tom's quarters.  
  
They'd been walking along in companionable silence, taking it a bit slow on account of Tom's newly healed leg. They weren't more than a few steps from sickbay when B'Elanna blurted out "Tom, you'll be ok on your own, right? I think I need to talk to Harry for a bit."  
  
"What about?"  
  
Yes, she asked herself. What about? How was she supposed to bring up how she felt? How, when the earthquake had quieted, she'd listened in the darkness for his voice, been certain he'd been crushed, felt the hopeless feeling that came from that. How relieved she'd been to hear his voice. How she'd admired his way of letting nothing bother him, seeming to be so certain that things would work out perfectly fine. How she'd meant to tell him how important he was, but she could never get the words out right. How she'd actually tried to impress him every chance she got. Her, Miss self- sufficient, perfectly sure of herself, trying to impress someone else.  
  
Someone she realized she cared for, more than she'd let herself admit.  
  
The thought hit her with perfect clarity, like walking into daylight.  
  
Tom was still staring at her, eyebrows raised.  
  
"Nothing much," she answered. "You'll be ok?" Barely waiting for his puzzled yes, she turned and walked quickly back to sickbay.  
  
And entered to see Harry unconscious and motionless on the floor.  
  
"Do you have any idea how much you scared me," B'Elanna whispered to Harry, reaching up to smooth a strand of hair away from his eyes. "When the Doctor and I pulled you up on the bed, it was like..like you were dead." She frowned at him, and her hand tightened around his. "How dare you not tell me you were hurt?"  
  
"I don't think I was thinking very clearly." His eyes were wide, and he was looking wonderingly at her face.  
  
"No," she admitted with a small smile, and touched the healed spot on his head. "I guess you wouldn't have been, would you?"  
  
They stared at each other for a long time, the quiet sounds of the ship a familiar background.  
  
Both started at once. "Harry-""B'Elanna-"  
  
A shared smile, and B'Elanna said "You first."  
  
"No, you go ahead."  
  
She growled. "Talk, Starfleet."  
  
"I had to ask," he started quickly. "Are you..and Tom..?"  
  
She blinked at him, and suddenly understood. Understood how all the care she'd given him on the planet could've looked, when it was really just concern for a friend and an attempt to distract herself from something she hated most: being trapped.  
  
"No," she answered at last. "Never have been."  
  
She saw relief wash over his face, making him even more fragilely beautiful than before. Felt his hand reach up to tentatively touch the side of her face.  
  
"What did you want to ask?" he said, his voice rough.  
  
"You just answered it." And she leaned forward and kissed him. 


End file.
